Distillation is a process in which a composite mixture is reduced to base elements. The diagram illustrates alcohol distillation.

Distillation is a process in which a composite mixture is reduced to base elements. The diagram illustrates alcohol distillation.

Photo: Mike Fisher

Family's distilling tradition kept alive

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For Boyan Kalusevic, distilling spirits is a family affair going back generations.

As a child, it was just something his family did in the backyard of his grandfather's home in Serbia, where the 92-year-old still lives. It was there that Kalusevic, who was born in Belgrade and lived there until he was 10, learned the ins and outs of distilling various spirits.

His childhood responsibilities during the summers at his grandfather's farm ranged from picking grapes and then removing their stems to swatting flies away from the afternoon lunch.

But he watched and learned, and now Kalusevic is taking the knowledge of the distillation process and applying it to a business venture more than 6,000 miles away.

Kalusevic and business partner Chris Mobley are finalizing plans to open Dorćol Distilling Co. (pronounced door-chole), a boutique distillery along South Flores Street in the burgeoning SoFlo district just south of downtown.

“I always thought how cool it would be to carry on the tradition,” Kalusevic said. “Everyone has been supportive of us going back to the basics.”

With this nearly $1 million venture, Kalusevic and Mobley, both 30, are entering an industry that has seen the number of U.S. craft distilleries grow by nearly 900 percent since 2000, according to data from the American Distilling Institute.

From his teenage years, Kalusevic frequently thought about turning his family's craft into a business. Whenever he would mention it, friends and family usually blew off the idea, rarely keeping a straight face. But after a trip to Europe last year, Kalusevic and Mobley decided to turn the gag into their life's work.

“We always joked about it, and I don't think we even took ourselves seriously,” Kalusevic said. “But in the end, it comes down to doing something you enjoy to feed your soul. So all we're doing is taking a century-old process, making it compliant and turning it into a business.”

Kalusevic's father, Miro Kalusevic, who lives in Kansas, said he was a bit surprised when his son told him about the venture. Miro Kalusevic said his father had always encouraged him to leave the family farm, so he became an engineer — a profession that got him off the land and eventually led him to live in various cities around the world, including San Antonio.

Although the family craft skipped a generation, he's proud that his son will keep the tradition alive.

“I was really surprised it was turned into a business,” he said. “Usually in Serbia, that's not the business, it's a family tradition. But it's really good if he likes that. Because it's really nice the boys are carrying it on into the future.”

And while proud of his grandson, Grandpa — who is retired from the craft — did give Kalusevic one piece of advice: “He told me, ‘Don't do it. You're crazy,'” Boyan Kalusevic said with a laugh.

Harvest tradition

At his grandfather's home in Belgrade and at the family farm outside the city limits, the Kalusevic family made its own distinct craft wine and spirit. It was offered to guests, given as gifts and drunk during holidays and special occasions.

“In Serbia it's quite a tradition for the family to make the rakia,” Miro Kalusevic, 55, said about the fruit-based spirit.

“Almost every farm has the recipe and thing that they do different than the other people. There wasn't a celebration that didn't start with rakia. You had to have it. It's what you represent your home with.”

The grape-based spirit usually was made once a year during the late-summer harvest at the family farm. Boyan Kalusevic's grandfather also had a still in the backyard of his house in Belgrade. There he made other spirits, including grain alcohol.

But it was the distillation process at the farm that drew a crowd.

The summer harvest at the farm usually started the same way, Kalusevic said. He remembers at the crack of dawn sitting on the veranda at a large wooden table featuring a spread of ripe tomatoes picked from the garden, bread, white cheese, prosciutto, hot coffee and small glasses filled with a homemade spirit to help the adults jump-start the day. People from around the neighborhood would drop in.

Occasionally, fresh fish would be delivered, and sometimes it was Kalusevic's job to keep flies off the catch and swat them with a small branch.

After a festive meal, members of the family would retreat into the grapevines. Kalusevic remembers picking grapes from the vine and loading them into a horse-drawn carriage. It was there that the distilling process began, and his grandfather was the brains behind the operation.

Process

Kalusevic's uncles and grandfather would extract the juice from the grapes to make wine, and what was left over was used to make spirits, he said.

As the grapes were mashed, a sweet aroma filled the air, Kalusevic said. The elixir was then transferred into buckets, which sat open for days as wild yeast in the air fermented the liquid, turning juice into high-alcohol liquor.

After the distillation process, Kalusevic's grandfather would separate the flavorful, drinkable liquor from the harsher alcohols by drenching his hands with the liquor, cupping his palms together, closing his eyes and taking a big whiff. From smell, he was able to determine the optimal time to gather the hearts of the liquor, or the safest, most flavorful and drinkable part of the spirit. It's a method Kalusevic said he will adopt at his distillery.

The alcoholic broth was finally bottled, and some containers were taken into the cellar beneath the house to age for years and sometimes decades.

Dorćol

Kalusevic and Mobley met nine years ago while attending the University of Texas at Austin. Mobley said he remembers Kalusevic mentioning his family's craft as a student. It was something that always intrigued him. But it wasn't until they took a trip to Europe and paid a visit to Kalusevic's family in Serbia that the idea became more solid. After seeing the distillation process firsthand, Mobley said, he was hooked.

“I told Boyan if you want to do it, let's do it,” Mobley said.

The company's name was taken from Dorcol, an urban area in Belgrade where Kalusevic and his family lived.

Financing has been secured and the site for their 2,700-square-foot facility has been purchased.

The process was slowed as they awaited a zoning change that was approved last month. Plus, they're waiting for the completion of their 400-liter copper still, being built in Serbia.

They're looking to get construction started before the year's end, and the operation could be producing a variety of spirits, including grain alcohols by early next year, Mobley said.

“I hope (my grandfather) can see it firsthand when it opens,” Kalusevic said.

What's in store at Dorćol is a production facility with a 400-square-foot tasting room and a courtyard for outdoor events. They chose an undeveloped lot after being impressed with the area's activity and liveliness after attending a Second Saturday, an art walk that occurs once a month at various galleries along South Flores Street.

Aside from distilling grain alcohols and other specialty batches, they plan to open the tasting room for Second Saturdays and various special event tastings, Mobley said. They will have the capacity to produce about 40,000 bottles but will probably start at around 10,000, Kalusevic said.

Their products will be distributed around the San Antonio area to start. Texas law prohibits them from selling their spirits at the distillery.

Until opening day, the partners will focus on the business aspects of the venture. They can't hone their craft because it is illegal to distill spirits at home, but they have been able to land a few apprenticeships at distilleries in Serbia, Chicago and Colorado, they said.

The two-man team will keep their day jobs while producing liquor after work and on weekends. Mobley works for the state and Kalusevic runs his own insurance management firm in San Antonio.